The CRC fractures
Pastors and churches troubled by new limits on church leadership.
Christian Reformed Church of North America (CRCNA) members from 116 congregations (representing 17 percent of the denomination and roughly 32,000 people) met in Grand Rapids, Michigan for a Convening of Concerned Congregations in August. Why were they concerned? It’s complicated.
Nate DeJong-McCarron, the director of a group called Better Together, said the event was organized in response to Synod 2024, which made several decisions about how to bring all 1,000 churches in the CRCNA into alignment with the denomination’s traditional position on marriage. The organizers expected that maybe 10 or 20 concerned churches would participate, so the large turnout was surprising. They also noticed that the attending churches came from geographically diverse (35 of the 49 classes were represented ) and theologically diverse backgrounds.
“There were several churches present who hold [LGBTQ+] affirming or full participation statements, but the vast majority either were decidedly conservative or have historically held a traditional perspective on the sexuality question. There was a significant group, too, that was undecided.” DeJong-McCarron says that the churches in attendance were united by one key issue: concern that the CRCNA had gone too far in limiting who can serve as officebearers – elders, deacons and pastors.
“At the very end of the two-day event, it was brought to the group’s attention that the topic of sexuality hadn’t been discussed at all,” recalls DeJong-McCarron. “The concern was much more around how we are restricting our leadership to a rather strict confessionalism.”
What is an officebearer?
We know CC’s readership is becoming more diverse and less CRC-focused. But we keep reporting on the CRC because many of us still have roots in this denomination or can relate to its storylines. So here’s a little note of translation, when we say “officebearer” or “elder or deacon” those are the lay leaders who would make up a session or consistory in a Presbyterian church or the vestry in an Anglican church. We know that these are the servant leaders who visit elderly members, serve Communion, meet with young people who want to profess their faith, oversee the committees/ministries of the church, pray with members in distress and regularly connect with each household in the congregation. This is how we show Christ’s love as a church. How we gatekeep these roles matters.
More rigid limits
When DeJong-McCarron says “confessionalism,” he means the requirement that all officebearers in the CRC fully agree to the denomination’s creeds and confessions, without room for exceptions. The Synod 2024 FAQ document from the Office of General Secretary Zachary King outlines a three-year process for bringing officebearers who find that they disagree with some aspect of the confessions into realignment.
According to that document, “the matter will be considered resolved when the officebearer affirms without reservation the confessions and anything that Synod has declared to have confessional status, submits a confessional-revision gravamen, or resigns from office.” Church members who are not yet elders or deacons but have the spiritual gifts for these roles are considered ineligible for leadership if they have reservations about any of the CRC’s doctrines.
For churches that are struggling to find enough office bearers to keep up with visiting and caring for the congregation, the FAQ document makes no accommodations. It reads: “Some councils may find it necessary to put forward a reduced slate of elder and deacon nominees in the next year or two while potential officebearers work through the process of understanding their alignment with the CRC’s positions.”
DeJong-McCarron says that under Synod’s new rules, elders, deacons and pastors who disagree with the CRC’s official positions on infant baptism, predestination and eternal security (doctrines laid out in the CRC’s confessions) are also now deemed ineligible to serve.
“That movement towards a more strict confessionalism was really the chief concern,” explains DeJong-McCarron. “In response to that, there was, I think, a pretty strong expression of a desire for more diversity, more tolerance of theological difference among those present [at the Convening of Concerned Congregations].”
Autonomy for Canadian churches
About 30 percent of the churches in attendance were Canadian. DeJong-McCarron says they were thrilled with that number because they know the Canadian side of the binational denomination is working through its own set of challenges. Christian Courier (CC) has previously reported on various Canadian efforts to assert independence in the CRC.
Toward CRC Canada, a group founded in 2023 to advocate for more autonomy for Canadian churches, says this most recent Synod has created more urgency for their group’s mission.
“Synod 2024 declared that church councils no longer have the authority to choose their own officebearers,” says Everett Vander Horst, chair of Toward CRC Canada. “A gravamen can no longer be prepared by a potential officebearer who has misgivings about the certain parts of the creeds and confessions, in spite of their gifts and a history of serving well in the past. We’ve been saying all along that Canadians need the autonomy to set ministry direction in our own churches and in our own country, without American overreach.”
Toward CRC Canada’s Facebook group tripled in size immediately after Synod 2024 and 100 people attended their mid-July post-Synod zoom call. More were turned away after the group reached its account limit.
Slowly eroding
Vander Horst says he has talked to pastors who would rather wait until the dust settles before they get involved. He is afraid that will be too late. “It is vitally important for us to get our message out there before the CRC in Canada splinters into many small and relatively insignificant pieces, with a few congregations joining either the RCA [Reformed Church in America] or PCC [Presbyterian Church in Canada], forming regional networks, loosely connected national associations, or cross-border partnerships. The net effect will be the loss of our shared ministries and the strength of our witness on the national stage.”
Peter Bulthuis, the recently hired Director of Engagement for Toward CRC Canada who previously worked for World Renew, points to the CRC’s long history of refugee resettlement and justice work. “We’ve done a whole lot of good things together, and the [CRCNA] committees and teams and agencies have encouraged congregations to do justice work,” says Bulthuis. “For us to lose that, to splinter away, would be a disaster. We’re looking at ‘What church does Christ want us to be in Canada?’ We’ve done some cool stuff. We could even do more cool stuff together if we stay together.”
Bulthuis and Vander Horst are worried that pastors, churches and even individual members who know about Synod’s move to more strict confessionalism will begin to leave the CRC one by one. In some ways, that exodus has already begun.
Leaving the CRC with ‘broken hearts’
CC reached out to a group known as the First Wave Steering Committee. They are helping nearly 100 pastors and a dozen churches on both sides of the border who have disaffiliated or are in the process of disaffiliating from the CRC. They know of two dozen more churches strongly considering disaffiliation.
“Since several congregations have been instructed by the CRCNA Synod to repent or leave the denomination, a bi-national group of congregational leaders, with broken hearts, have been in conversation with one another regarding next steps,” says Elizabeth Koning, a representative for the group. “Some support the full participation of LGBTQ+ members, others find the new restrictions on disagreement with Synod untenable, and others simply protest the heavy handedness of our recent leadership.”
Koning says there are four main paths that Canadian churches are considering: join another denomination (usually PCC or RCA), work with Toward CRC Canada for a transformed CRC, be an independent congregation (for a season or permanently), or join a network of churches such as one called The Good Table. The team recognizes that there may be other paths of which they are unaware.
CC also reached out to the RCA Regional Synod of Canada for comment but CC were asked to wait as the denomination sorts through its own structural changes. At least 25 percent of congregations (accounting for 41 percent of membership) in the RCA have left now that the denomination affirms same-sex marriage. The conservative ones in Canada formed the Reformation Canada Network in October 2022 and those that remain are discussing forming an independent denomination with ecumenical ties with the RCA.
Is Better Together starting a new denomination?
Better Together is launching a new initiative called A Community of Churches. It’s a two-year program that offers monthly mentorship meetings, soul care retreats for leaders and participation in The Colossian Forum workshops. Nate DeJong McCarron, Director of Better Together, says this is not a new denomination but a framework of resources to help congregations as they come to their own conclusions about their future in the CRCNA.
“Whether [churches] are committed to staying within the Christian Reformed Church or whether they feel they need to disaffiliate and move into a different space, all churches are facing these two realities of conflict and change,” says DeJong McCarron.
Christian Courier asked how these resources are different from those the CRC already provides via Thrive.
“[Churches] would be wise to look at the denomination as the first responder to help meet the needs, pinch points, concerns that you’re experiencing. That said, we at Better Together also recognize that the actions of Synod have caused many churches to become growingly suspicious of the official denominational resources. We don’t celebrate that, but we recognize that. In that space, we wonder if congregations could also benefit from a more external support system as they do this important discernment work around conflict and change.”
The cost for Canadian churches to participate is $10,000 for the full two years (twice the cost that American churches will pay since they are eligible for funding from the Lily Foundation).
Loss and confusion
Much like the RCA, the CRC is in a phase of transition, with churches moving away from the denomination for opposite reasons. Koning acknowledges that there are many church members feeling disenfranchised or alone in the process. “Many are experiencing a loss of religious identity and heritage, disillusionment with church, confusion and even betrayal,” Koning says. “We encourage concerned individuals to continue to pray and to work as Christ models and the Holy Spirit leads, and we hope that they find comfort in knowing that they are not alone.” She encourages these people to join Facebook groups like CRCNA Disaffiliation Information, All One Body or Toward CRC Canada.
The CRC is in a phase of transition, with churches moving away from the denomination for opposite reasons.
Toward CRC Canada has been accused of schismatic motivations, but Vander Horst says that’s a misrepresentation of their aims. “Our goal is to bring greater unity for Canadian churches, and reduce the tension,” explains Vander Horst. “Members ought not be naive about what the future holds; sitting tight and hoping this will all go away is wishful thinking at best, a dereliction of duty at worst. We are caught up in American culture wars foreign to our Canadian way of being in community. Canadians, living in an intentionally multicultural society, have a greater capacity to work together across differences. Let’s free ourselves to do that together.”
Toward CRC Canada believes that path includes space for thoughtful critique, open dialogue and collaboration between leaders. Vander Horst and DeJong-McCarron confirmed that Toward CRC Canada and Better Together continue to have conversations, although they do not have a formal partnership.
As the CRC navigates change and conflict, the space to prayerfully talk through those concerns, whether it’s on a Facebook page or around a council table, feels a little like holy ground. If each concerned congregation or disillusioned member can bring their hopes and laments with open hands, some still believe it’s possible to piece things together.
Considering disaffiliating?
The First Wave Steering Committee focus statement reads: “We serve the congregations and clergy disaffiliating within a year, listening for their pain points and obstacles, imagining and developing pragmatic solutions and partnerships to propose to the group, all while leaving a space for the Spirit’s voice and dreaming visions for what we could be.” If your congregation could benefit from this support, reach out to the steering team at [email protected].
I wonder if the problems within the CRC and RCA are related to being ‘righteous overmuch.’
The lawmakers and rule holders have replaced grace, love and the gospel with doctrine and law in the CRC. My question , is this what Christ lived and died for?
The Toward CRC Canada movement seems to be too little too late. I am hoping it is not, although a Canadian synod should have been established two decades ago as it would have short circuited the current state of affairs. The Canadian CRC is proportionally larger than the American CRC, we already have our own universities and establishing a seminary would merely be a matter of hiring professors from a deep pool of candidates. What we now have is a denomination headquartered in a country obsessed with violence, war and gun culture. To even imagine that any portion of the Christian Canadian population shares these values is beyond naive. Even our most conservative citizens know that Canadian culture is radically different from American culture. In his current opinion piece David Koysis remarks on the recent re-election of Donald Trump and the inevitable chaos his sycophants will wreak upon our world. Not a word about this corrupt serial sexual deviant, convicted felon and outright thief has come from our denomination. Considering the tactics of the Abide group working within the CRC it is not hard to see an alignment with current conservative political movements in the U.S. It is worth noting how many current and former members of the American CRC are or have been Republican candidates for public office and come to the conclusion that the silence is intentional. So much for any salt and light on its home turf coming from Grand Rapids. One could attribute the sorry state of the American experiment to late stage capitalism or its primitive political process (having been bought by oligarchs and sold to the poor and ignorant) or maybe even its just the decline of empire. What is sure is maintaining the connection to an ecclesiatically legalist denomination that is becomimg a reflection of a soon to be failed state cannot be taken lightly. By closing its doors to anyone, closing it eyes to societal corruption and closing off discussion of the mission of Christ’s body yet another candle is snuffed out on the path to a dark age. Canadians are better than this, and we are being held back. In the past we have been meek and accommodating but maybe it is finally time to strike out on our own. This is not schismatic, merely an assertion that the body of Christ is dynamic and moves forward to meet all people where they are, especially here in Canada.
Is it “righteous overmuch” to subscribe to the Three Forms of Unity? Or is it “righteous overmuch” to claim membership in a church but deny the creeds of that church? If one could not subscribe to the creeds of the church, wouldn’t it be honest to leave for a church with creeds you could subscribe to, or a church with no creeds?